Using lantern.rest to Display Your Discord Presence

Ever wanted to showcase your Discord status, current gaming session, or Spotify tracks on your personal website? Enter Lantern, a powerful service that makes it incredibly easy to broadcast your Discord presence in real-time. In this post, we'll explore how Lantern works and how you can integrate it into your projects.

What is Lantern?

Lantern is a service that broadcasts your Discord presence through both a RESTful API and WebSocket connections. It's designed to be simple to use while offering robust functionality for developers who want to display Discord status information on their websites or applications.

Key Features

Real-time Updates: Get instant updates about status changes through WebSocket connections
RESTful API: Simple HTTP endpoints for fetching user data
Spotify Integration: Display currently playing track (if available on your Discord presence)
Rich Presence Support: Show detailed information about games and activities
Key-Value Storage: Store and retrieve custom data for additional functionality
Ready to Use: Works out of the box without any deployment needed

Getting Started

Using the REST API

The simplest way to get started is by using the REST API. You can fetch a user's presence data with a simple GET request to:

lantern.rest/api/v1/users/:your_id

This endpoint returns comprehensive information about the user, including:

Current status (online, idle, etc.)
Active platforms (desktop, mobile, web)
Current activities
Spotify listening data (if available)
User metadata

Real-time Updates with WebSocket

For real-time updates, Lantern provides a WebSocket connection at wss://lantern.rest/socket. The WebSocket implementation follows a simple protocol:

Connect to the WebSocket endpoint
Receive a hello message with heartbeat interval
Initialize the connection with your user ID
Receive real-time updates about presence changes

Advanced Features

Key-Value Storage

Lantern includes a built-in key-value storage system that you can use for:

Storing configuration values
Managing dynamic data for your website
Keeping track of user preferences
Temporary data storage

The KV storage system is accessible through both the REST API and WebSocket connections, making it versatile for various use cases.

Customization Options

When fetching user data, you can customize the response with various parameters:

Generate SVG representations of the user's status
Choose between light and dark themes
Adjust border radius and other visual elements
Hide specific components like global name, status, or badges
Customize "no activity" messages

Implementation Example

Here's a simple example of how you might implement real-time Discord presence on your website:

index.js

const ws = new WebSocket('wss://lantern.rest/socket');

ws.onmessage = event => {
  const data = JSON.parse(event.data);
  
  if (data.op === 1) { // Hello
    // Set up heartbeat
    setInterval(() => {
      ws.send(JSON.stringify({ op: 4 }));
    }, data.d.heartbeat_interval);
    
    // Initialize connection
    ws.send(JSON.stringify({
      op: 2,
      d: { user_id: "YOUR_DISCORD_ID" }
    }));
  }
  
  if (data.op === 6) { // Presence Update
    // Update your UI with the new presence data
  }
};

Self-Hosting Options

While Lantern is ready to use out of the box, you can also self-host it if you need complete control over the infrastructure. The project is open-source and includes detailed documentation for setting up your own instance.

Conclusion

The combination of real-time WebSocket updates and a straightforward REST API makes it flexible enough for both simple implementations and complex applications. Plus, with the added bonus of key-value storage, you can extend its functionality to suit your specific needs.

Ready to get started? Head over to the Lantern documentation to begin integrating Discord presence into your projects today!

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